Better to Live Vicariously
by Emberwillow14
Summary: Eli can't understand why Clare won't put her heart into her writing. "I can feel the hesitation. There isn't any passion here. Your words are empty, yet I know that you can really write something that's full and hearty. Why won't you?" "I'm afraid."


**This is just a short little one-shot I did in around twenty minutes. I really hope you like this, and I'd really appreciate it if you let me know what you think! Also, if you like this check out the Eclare fic I'm writing, Beauty From Pain!**

**Disclaimer: As with every fanfiction, yes, even the ones that Madame Degrassi writes, this author does not own any of the characters featured on the show Degrassi. **

"Why are you so afraid to write?" Eli asked Clare as they sat in his room, working on their latest English assignment.

"What do you mean?" she asked.

"Well, this story is ok, but I can feel the hesitation. There isn't any passion here. Your words are empty, yet I know that you can really write something that's good, something that's full and hearty. Take this character, Melissa. She's pretty flat."

"I love Melissa. She's tough and strong and doesn't ever quit."

"Sure, but she doesn't have any defining features. Throughout the story she's only ever referred to as Melissa."

"What would you have me refer to her as?"

"What about Mell?"

Clare gave him an incredulous look. "Mel?"

"No, Mell, with two "l"s, as in pell-mell."

"And that will add something to my writing."

Eli looked at her deeply then, seeing past the façade she had erected to keep him out. "You know that it will. Why won't you write, really? I want to know."

Clare thought back to Declan and her fanfictions and how they'd gotten out of hand. She shrugged.

Eli shook his head, not satisfied in the least with her answer. "Tell me," he demanded again.

Clare looked him defiantly in the eyes. "No."

Eli raised an eyebrow. "Then I'll have to get the answer out of you one way or another."

He jolted from his back, lying on the bed, to attack Clare, pushing her backwards and onto her back, her head hitting the pillows as her hands and legs were trapped by Eli's body. "Get off of me, Eli!" she said, but he wasn't going to have any of that.

"Tell me why."

She looked into his green eyes and wondered if she wanted to tell him. "You won't like the answer."

The green softened slightly as he smirked. "Try me."

Clare sighed. "I'm afraid." Her voice was so quiet Eli nearly missed what she'd said.

"You're _afraid? _Afraid of what?"

She darted her eyes to the left of his head so she didn't have to look into those curious eyes. "Myself." She didn't want to tell him, not everything. But when she muttered that one word and looked back into his eyes everything began to flood out, and she couldn't reign it back in.

"I'm afraid of my body, of what it wants and what it thinks of and creates and writes down. I'm afraid that if I let it go out of hand I'll imagine something dirty, something naughty, and then there will be no going back. And I'll do something stupid that I'll regret for my entire life, just because I decided to let my mind go haywire and write down what I'm really thinking."

Eli was silent for a moment before he rocked back on his heels and allowed Clare to sit up. She pressed her back against his headboard and looked at him warily, hugging her arms to her midriff.

"Clare, you shouldn't be afraid to write down what's in your head." She looked up at Eli and saw the truth in his next words. "If you keep it in, if you keep denying it, you will eventually burst, and you'll act on everything you're trying to keep inside of you. I don't want you to ever do something stupid like that, and if you have to write naughty things to keep yourself from doing them, then I say better to live vicariously through your writing, where you'll never look back and say, "Oh, I should have never done that," then keep it bottled up inside until the cork pops and your whole world becomes about the very thing you've saved yourself from."

She looked up at him. "How did you get so smart?"

He smirked. "Fanfiction, Madame Degrassi."

**I'm thinking of writing a companion oneshot that goes along with this idea...it's in my head, so it'll probably be on this site :)**

**Review, please?**

**Em =]**


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